Wooden buildings laugh at fireballs. Energy damage applied to objects is first halved, and then reduced by hardness. So a fireball that hits a simple wooden door (10hp, 5 hardness) would need to deal 30 (!) damage to destroy it. So a level 9 wizard on average.

If you think about it, this makes sense. Wood is actually not very "burny." To use wood for a fire, you have to take the effort of making sure it's dry and then build the fire up really carefully.

Energy Attacks wrote:

Some energy types might be particularly effective against certain objects, subject to GM discretion. For example, fire might do full damage against parchment, cloth, and other objects that burn easily.

I don't think it's unreasonable for a GM to rule that an explosion of fire is particularly effective against wood. That said, a dedicated blastet is doing more than level d 6 damage.

Keep in mind, most wizards, blasters or otherwise, don't want their fireballs to deal full damage to wood. Imagine you have a nice little brawl in the corrupt noble's mansion. He drops a fireball, and all the walls in a 30ft burst disintegrate and the roof collapses :p

Wooden buildings laugh at fireballs. Energy damage applied to objects is first halved, and then reduced by hardness. So a fireball that hits a simple wooden door (10hp, 5 hardness) would need to deal 30 (!) damage to destroy it. So a level 9 wizard on average.

If you think about it, this makes sense. Wood is actually not very "burny." To use wood for a fire, you have to take the effort of making sure it's dry and then build the fire up really carefully.

Why bother with a crust at all? Your hollow world could be a pocket in an infinitely vast plane. This could be taking place on the elemental plane of earth.

I like Matthew Downie Idea about the two separate cultures separated by the gravitational "ocean." It makes the fact that you are in a hollow world relevant to the plot. Maybe one of the cultures has discovered that it's Chosen One was born in the other gravity band. So the PCs must travel through the vast wilderness that is known as The Lands of Weight to retrieve the Chosen One. Those lands are filled with all manner of bizarre organisms, and the pcs must always contend with the extreme gravity.

Once they arrive on the other side, they find a world that is more alien for how similar it is to their own. The customs are strange and their values clash. The supposed Chosen One is unsympathetic to the PC's plight and uninterested in coming with them. Now they must find some leverage or proceed to kidnap him.

While a strict reading of the rules tells us that foci do not count as material components, I think the intent is that sorcerers can cast spells "from the blood" as it were.

Focuses are pretty similar to material components, in that both are found in the spell component pouch, both are physical materials.

Also, note the feat False Focus. It uses the same language as Eschew Materials, but it seems that it was meant to replace foci as well. Or at least that is what I read the flavor as. Since it is hard to impersonate a priest if you sill need to fiddle with bits of leather.

So: I think that the intent of Eschew Materials and False Focus is that they are both there to replace all material/foci components that are not there for balance pourposes.

I feel that, from a flavor point of view, Intimidate causes you to act against your best interest because you are afraid. It impairs your thinking. If you are a creature that can't be scared, then intimidate should not do anything.

A vampire may do what you want when you threaten them with a holy avenger, but it will only do that because it is the rational choice at the time.

Also, the fact that PF is missing the fear effect language that was there in 3.5 might mean that they just forgot it. This happend a lot in other sections of the rules.

You could get a caster behind the group, and have that caster cast scare. Then the orc would run through the lines of the ambusher and would be picked up by a second crew with saps that are a run action down the allyway.

Its not +4. This is because you are giving up an attack to activate it, so it is not correct to use the +X system to price it. Amanuensis provides a good alternative. Though If the weapon was also magical, you would have to multiply the cost of the lower of the weapon price or frost-fall by 1.5.

That said, I think both frost and frosty burst are mediocre enhancments. If you wanted your frosty burst weapon to cast frostfall on a crit, I would probobly allow it.

Objective does not mean that "there is no debate over it on the boards." It means that there is no debate over it in character. A paladin can tell you, with absolute certainty, that a particular person, place or thing is Evil. That's objective.

Almost. Detect evil is not quite so cut and dried.

If a good cleric of a [Good] god with an aura of good has actively evil intentions while being scanned by detect evil he will detect as evil.

Quote:

Creatures with actively evil intents count as evil creatures for the purpose of this spell.

Detect evil does not tell you whether someone is evil or not, just that they are either evil, have an evil subtype, or have actively evil intentions.

Also there are a ton of ways to hide an evil alignment from detection.

In character it is really hard to objectively know something is evil as opposed to just probably evil.

Objectively the evil exists in the game, there can be plenty of debate over evil in character though.

Well sure, you can trick people and the like. I just meant that Evil is a measurable quantity, like temperature or peanuts. It is a thing that exists. You could argue about whether a creature is Evil or just looks evil but no-one sane will say "well the devil thinks it is good!" Not even the devil.

That's utterly ridiculous and a VERY good reason not to play in Golarion, where Saturday Morning Cartoon morality runs rampant.

Redicuous or not, this is how Golarion is. This is also how Greyhawk and Faerun worked. Your home game may be different, but when you are talking to a random person on the boards, this is the assumption. Pretending that it is otherwise and that everyone should know this is a recipe for point-less arguments and frustration.

Zhayne wrote:

Since what actions are and aren't evil is, by definition, subjective (and...

This is not even accepted as truth in the real world. A substantial number of people will argue that good is what God wills, and is objective. Others might argue that good is that which minimizes suffering, and is thus mesurable and objective.

The point of making alignment objective in Golarion is to reduce arguments at the table by letting the DM say "This is just how it works here. He is wearing his Evil pants."

No spells should have alignment descriptors. What the spell is doesn't matter, how you use it does.

There is no reason that both can't matter.

Consider the proverbial time-traveler that goes ad kills baby Hitler. The murder of a baby is an evil act. However, preventing the holocaust must be a good act (ignore the paradox problem. Say the time traveler solved it).

So is what the time traveler did a good or an evil act? you can't pick just one, because in that one action there were two acts. Spells are the same way. Summoning a devil is and evil act. Forcing that devil to work at the soup-kitchen is a good act. Whichever of those is metaphysically stronger in your world determines your character's alignment.

Would you not agree that summoning an angel to work your soup-kitchen is a more good act than using a devil?

People tell me that the alignment system in PF is objective. If this is the case, then intent doesn't and can't matter; by definition, that's subjective.

This is (yet) another case that demonstrates that alignment is unworkable, contradictory, and a useless morass.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA... Sorry but "alignment system in PF is objective" cracked me up. Whoever told you that clearly haven't spent much time on this forum. There are insane amounts of discussion about what the different alignments should mean. This part of the rules is probably the most subjective there is in this game and you should expect extreme table variance.

I don't find alignment useless exactly, but I will grant you that it is a huge mess. Personally speaking I'm fine with it because in the groups I play in we have come to an understanding about it (different for each group, but still).
I could see it as very annoying for PFS with players/GMs you don't know or play with often because you will be told one thing at one table and another thing at another table and you wont be able to point to the rules and disprove either.

Objective does not mean that "there is no debate over it on the boards." It means that there is no debate over it in character. A paladin can tell you, with absolute certainty, that a particular person, place or thing is Evil. That's objective.

Men who have deservedly won the Congressional Medal of Honor have soiled themselves in the conduct of their "above and beyond" duty. That qualifies as Scared ******** and yet they did it.

Being afraid does not mean being confused or otherwise irrational.

If the Fear spell induces unabated spastic running away, then I refer you back to the in-game definition of "panicked" and this part of my previous post that responds to said definition:

Those portions I bolded are in DIRECT CONFLICT with each other.

Which is to say, as written, the "panicked" condition doesn't make sense. Not a lick.

Coriat wrote:

Per the panicked condition, you cannot choose to go back into the maze on this basis. Although it may be the only way that your character knows leads out...

My PC can cast a Haste spell without penalty that takes Verbal, Somatic, and Material components, yet he otherwise runs around in circles?

Really? I mean, really?

Can't we just say the RAW are a little broke here? Mainly just the description of the "panicked" condition.

Coriat wrote:

You just described the thought process of a person who passed their Will save.

No. Said PC is still under the effects of the Fear. Meaning she cannot choose to attack the BBEG but must instead put distance between herself and BBEG at all costs - Or - decide to burn a potion of Remove Fear to be more effective at getting away.

Which, once the potion is effective, would then allow said PC to confront the BBEG if so chosen but also allow her to effectively get out. The latter being the reason for drinking the potion, the former being a potentially useful side effect.

Again, casting a spell is a heck of a lot more involved than popping the cork and quaffing a potion. My PC can do the first [which requires exacting recall and coordinated execution of...

Why stop there? According to your logic, the PC could attack the BBEG because the fastest way to not be afraid is to remove the source of your fear!

Also, those who are "scared s@@&less" are not "panicked." Panicked people are the guys who trip when running away from zombies.

Ability damage is not really damage. It's more of a debuff. You can convert drain/damage into conditions instead of tracking scaling penalties. Keep track of the damage/drain as normal, but apply regular conditions at certain thresholds.

If the damage is more than 2, but less than half the character's stat, apply the lesser condition, if it is more than half, apply the greater condition. If the damage is more than the stat, then the character is unconscious.

Defining "natural" to mean "part of the natural world" is sort of silly. Because then you could argue that everything is natural. Even undead, as they appear spontaneously, some would even say naturally. This is not a useful definition.

Natural is usually used to mean X steps removed from what is made by mindless processes. Where X is something reasonable small.

As untyped bonuses from the same source, they wouldn't stack. The confusing nature of the feat, of course, is why that Special clause tongue-in-cheekly refers to the fact that the designer really needs to specify what happens if you take it multiple times.

But then this means that both the feat *and* the Attribute is the source.

This ruling bothers me a lot. I feel that this makes it hard to figure out what feats/abilities actually do by reading them. Cause now you have to keep in mind how that feat calculates its numbers. It just feels to me that it is needlessly constraining future design space. The bonus type-system is elegant and intuitive. You can tell what stacks and what does not just by reading a feat or ability. Making attributes sources means that you need to back track where modifiers come from.

A specific example is of Fury's Fall, where whether that feat does anything at all is dependent on if I have Agile Maneuvers or not. And that means that when I take Agile Maneuvers I need to now note on my sheet that my attack bonus now has a dex component.

So, if we are going to be patching all the stuff that this FAQ broke with more FAQ, wouldn't be simpler to have said that untyped bonuses always stack, and then patched the cases that were broken before? Like saying that "fury's fall does not stack with weapon finesse"?

Also, Mark, question about your hypothetical feat that let you add your charisma as a bunch of different bonuses: What would happen if two of the options were:
- You gain a bonus equal to your strength bonus to AC
- You gain a bonus equal to your Wisdom bonus to AC

Would taking both of those options let you have both your Strength and your Wisdom, because both of those are different sources, or is the feat also a source?

This is where I as a GM allow the player to throw 30000 shields. And then tell him his max damage does not manage to overcome it's DR. Since he doesn't get the magic bonus to shield damage. Then I immediately ask him one more question.

"How are you still breathing and living? You just went through the motions of throwing and unstrapping 30000 times in 0 seconds. No human body can take that. Even if you want to say it took more than 0 seconds you still have quite some explaining to do. In fact at 6 seconds you are still moving so fast that you have turned yourself into a fine red mist."

No amount of rules whoring will get you out of that and consequently, the pathfinder version of hell since they technically committed suicide. No deity likes followers that commit suicide unless evil. Even then they prefer you kill others in their name rather than yourself. Also you'd be in a form of hell anyways since your god is evil.

Also none of these rules cover retrieving a shield. Ready and searching through a bag are two separate things. Unless there is an item that allows you to pull items out as a free action. Either way he's still red mist. And explaining some things to the gods.

There are no rules for moving too fast in pathfinder. Try again.

Also, with a Clustered Shots and a blink-back belt, we can make attacks with our shield at all targets in 5 range increments for ifinite damage.

I've always wanted to build Master Yi from league of legends. His signature move is moving so fast so as to cut four people before they feel the slash. Standard Wushu stuff. You can do it with the magus and dimensional agility line of feats, but that comes online way to late and I play games that are pre level 10. Also Master Yi does not use shocking grasp :p and he wields a two-handed sword.

Say I add a feat that says: your ranged hits automatically threaten criticals. Ranged characters are already strong, but at this point there is no reason to play any melee damage dealer. Diversity is lost.

On the other hand it is not the case that there is one optimal build. Since your goal is 'defeat the monsters' not 'max dpr' you can for example, buff allies or debuff enemies or controll the battlefield, or be really good against undead, etc...

Lets step back a moment. Do you really need strong-jaw specifically, or are you just trying to beef-up your ac a bit? Whats wrong with a flaming aomf? It boosts damage and saves headaches... items that directly boost attack damage should be priced as +s anyway, so if you absolutely needed strong jaw, id price as a +2 or +3 weapon enchantment.

In my mind, crafting is not supposed to give you half price anything. Its about customization. You find a +1 human bane sword, you sell it for half price and make a +1 undead bane sword. Net gain is 0.

Without the feat, you sell the sword for half price, and then wait for the dm to increase loot drops to bring you up to appropriate wealth :p Maybe you find a +2 sword later, but the correct bane was useful right *now* so the feat is not wasted.

I've been thinking about this on and off for a while. Bows are sort of the TWF option of the ranged world. They attack lots and get value from flat damage adds.

What if we made the crossbow the two-handed weapon of the ranged world? So forget about multiple attacks. A crossbow expert gets 1.5x deadly-aim bonus, and 1.5x stat modifier to damage rolls. Rapid-reload does not affect crossbows. Finally, have the multiplier scale with your bab, so it replaces iterative attacks.

Since strength does not make sense for crossbow damage use wisdom bonus for the bonus damage, to represent greater aim.

Since you are not making iterative attacks, you can't fairly have the same maximum damage as the bowman, so I am thinking that high-level crossbow feats should let you apply status effects of some kind.

I would need to run the numbers os it works out corretly, but this sort of what I am thinking of:

[Deadly aim]
Change to give +3 damage for each -1 taken when using crossbows.

[Crossbow Savant]
Requires: Point Blank Shot, Martial Weapon Proficiency (crossbow)
When making a single crossbow attack as a standard action, full round action, or AoO you add 1.5 your wisdom bonus to your damage roll. At each 5 points of BaB beyond 1, the bonus damage from this feat increases by 0.5.

My favorite denizen of magical ruins is the living spell from 3.5. Basically it was a spell given life by a magic accident. It was represented by an ooze that casts the spell on anything it hits or engulfs. My favorite was a living darkness that affects every object it touches with that spell. Scary if the PCs don't have the darkvision.

It also got my pcs to say "I shoot the darkness" in full seriousness :D

Another idea: living grease and some tiny flying animated objects. The grease will make it hard to navigate as it greases the floor, and makes pcs drop weapons while the flying objects will harass them. Incidentally, being affected by the g r ease will make it really easy to escape from its engulf attack, so the encounter should not be super deadly but amusing.